'Are you now or have you ever been a member of the Communist Party?' That question was to be repeated endlessly during the anti-Communist investigations carried out by the House Committee on un-American Activities (HUAC) in the early 1950s. The refusal of ten members of the film industry to answer the question in 1947 led to the decision by studio bosses to fire them and never to hire known Communists in the future. The Hearings led to scores of actors, writers and directors being named as Communists or sympathisers. All were blacklisted and fired. Hollywood's Blacklists is a history of the political and cultural factors relevant to understanding the why and the how of the various investigations of the alleged Communist infiltration of Hollywood. What was HUAC? What propaganda role did films play during World War II and the Cold War? What values were at stake in the confrontation between Left and Right that saw the former so resoundingly defeated and expelled from Hollywood? Answers to these and other questions are offered via analyses of the motives of the various players and of the tactics deployed by HUAC to reward collaboration and punish dissent.

From the New York Times-bestselling author of The Searchers, the revelatory story behind the classic movie High Noon and the toxic political climate in which it was created. It's one of the most revered movies of Hollywood's golden era. Starring screen legend Gary Cooper and Grace Kelly in her first significant film role, High Noon was shot on a lean budget over just thirty-two days but achieved instant box-office and critical success. It won four Academy Awards in 1953, including a best actor win for Cooper. And it became a cultural touchstone, often cited by politicians as a favorite film, celebrating moral fortitude. Yet what has been often overlooked is that High Noon was made during the height of the Hollywood blacklist, a time of political inquisition and personal betrayal. In the middle of the film shoot, screenwriter Carl Foreman was forced to testify before the House Committee on Un-American Activities about his former membership in the Communist Party. Refusing to name names, he was eventually blacklisted and fled the United States. (His co-authored screenplay for another classic, The Bridge on the River Kwai, went uncredited in 1957.) Examined in light of Foreman's testimony, High Noon's emphasis on courage and loyalty takes on deeper meaning and importance. In this book, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Glenn Frankel tells the story of the making of a great American Western, exploring how Carl Foreman's concept of High Noon evolved from idea to first draft to final script, taking on allegorical weight. Both the classic film and its turbulent political times emerge newly illuminated.

In 1947, the Cold War came to Hollywood. Over nine tumultuous days in October, the House Un-American Activities Committee held a notorious round of hearings into alleged Communist subversion in the movie industry. The blowback was profound: the major studios pledged to never again employ a known Communist or unrepentant fellow traveler. The declaration marked the onset of the blacklist era, a time when political allegiances, real or suspected, determined employment opportunities in the entertainment industry. Hundreds of artists were shown the door—or had it shut in their faces. In Show Trial, Thomas Doherty takes us behind the scenes at the first full-on media-political spectacle of the postwar era. He details the theatrical elements of a proceeding that bridged the realms of entertainment and politics, a courtroom drama starring glamorous actors, colorful moguls, on-the-make congressmen, high-priced lawyers, single-minded investigators, and recalcitrant screenwriters, all recorded by newsreel cameras and broadcast over radio. Doherty tells the story of the Hollywood Ten and the other witnesses, friendly and unfriendly, who testified, and chronicles the implementation of the postwar blacklist. Show Trial is a rich, character-driven inquiry into how the HUAC hearings ignited the anti-Communist crackdown in Hollywood, providing a gripping cultural history of one of the most transformative events of the postwar era.

Allan Ryskind, son of Marx Brothers screenwriter Morrie Ryskind (Animal Crackers, A Night at the Opera, Room Service), exposes the ugly truth about the Communists blacklisted from the film industry. Too often, the "Hollywood Ten" brought before the House Un-American Activities Committee are memorialized as victims of an unjust witch-hunt and heroes who stood up for free speech. The truth is shocking: Not only did these supposed liberal paragons adore Josef Stalin and take their orders directly from the Communist Party, but they also sympathized with Adolf Hitler. Ryskind, who grew up in the heart of the Hollywood scene and personally knew many of the key players in this real-life Hollywood drama, has penned a definitive, myth-busting account of the Hollywood Ten and Hollywood Blacklist that will forever change the way you think about the ideological battle waged in the movie capital of the world. With glossy photographs.

Seventy-five years ago, the Hollywood blacklist ruined lives, stifled creativity, and sent waves of proscription and censorship throughout United States culture. When the Hollywood Ten refused to answer the questions of the House Committee on Un-American Activities about their membership in the Communist Party, they were sentenced to prison, the five who were under contract were fired by their studios, and all were blacklisted from reemployment until they "purged themselves of their communist taint." By the 1950s, this blacklist publicly stigmatized nearly three hundred other Americans in the entertainment industry who invoked the First and Fifth Amendments in their refusal to apologize for their Communist ties or provide the names of other members. Dozens of others were graylisted as the result of rumors. The Hollywood Motion Picture Blacklist: Seventy-Five Years Later offers new insights on the origins of the blacklist, the characteristics of those blacklisted, and the probability of future proscriptions of the blacklist type. Author Larry Ceplair draws on previously published work while introducing new material to vigorously recount the events that took place between the US government, Hollywood unions, and motion picture studios. Ceplair thoroughly examines the role of Jewish identity in many anti-communist efforts—a concept that has never been fully examined by scholars—and analyzes the actions of subpoenaed witnesses who were forced to choose between cooperating with the House Committee or joining the blacklist. This fascinating book is an illuminating examination of a dark period in American history and the fragility of our rights to free speech and due process.

A definitive guide to the directors, actors and actresses, writers, producers, designers, films, and more who were blacklisted in Hollywood during the McCarthy era encompasses more than two thousand entries that provide a fascinating glimpse of the entertainment industry during one of its darkest periods in history. Original. 10,000 first printing.

'Un-American Hollywood' debates the blacklist era and the aesthetic and political work of the Hollywood Left. Featuring case studies focusing on contexts of production and reception, it offers perspectives on the role of progressive politics within a capitalist media industry.

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More than sixty years ago, McCarthyism silenced Hollywood. In the pages of Tender Comrades, those who were suppressed, whose lives and careers were ruined, finally have their say. A unique collection of profiles in cinematic courage, this extraordinary oral history brings to light the voices of thirty-six blacklist survivors (including two members of the Hollywood Ten), seminal directors of film noir and other genres, starring actresses and memorable supporting players, top screenwriters, and many less known to the public, who are rescued from obscurity by the stories they offer here that, beyond politics, open a rich window into moviemaking during the Golden Age of Hollywood.

“This is the book we’ve been waiting for! The true story of the much mythologized ‘Hollywood Ten’ by a scion of Hollywood royalty.” — Ann Coulter, author of twelve New York Times bestsellers, including Adios America: The Left's Plan to Turn Our Country Into a Third World Hell-Hole “Coming from one who has not only studied the postwar period in Hollywood but actually lived in it, Hollywood Traitors offers a rare perspective that is sure to prompt discussion and re-examination of the time when Stalin drew higher praise in some U.S. motion pictures than he did in Russian films.”—John Gizzi, White House correspondent and chief political colunist, Newsmax “A real-life thriller about the movies, exploding the fifty-year myth that the Hollywood were innocent victims of a witch hunt. Must read for students of Cold War history.”—M. Stanton Evans, author of Blacklisted by History: The Untold Story of Senator Joe McCarthy and His Fight against America’s Enemies There is a myth about the Hollywood Blacklist. The “Hollywood Ten” were dragged before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) and grilled on their associations with Communism, hid behind their Fifth Amendment rights, and refused to name names of Hollywood Communists. They were completely shut out from the filmmaking industry by Congress and considered the heroes of the hour by many in Hollywood. But it’s time to set the record straight. In Hollywood Traitors: Blacklisted Screenwriters—Agents of Stalin, Allies of Hitler, Allan Ryskind reveals how the alleged “victims” of the Hollywood Blacklist were actually ideological thugs: enthusiastic Stalinists committed to bringing about a socialist utopia in America—even by violent revolution. Ryskind, a long-time editor of Ronald Reagan’s favorite publication, Human Events, tells the true story of how these screenwriters prostituted their talent in the service of anti-American, pro-Communist propaganda. Ryskind pens the riveting report from an insider’s perspective. His father, Morrie Ryskind, was a screenwriter in Hollywood and was joined by Ronald Reagan, John Wayne, Walt Disney, and others at the forefront of the anti-Communist movement in Hollywood—even at the expense of their careers and reputations. In Hollywood Traitors you will learn: How the Hollywood Communists took their orders straight from the Party headquarters in New York, which in turn took them directly from Stalin’s Comintern, responsible for promoting international revolution How Communists attempted to take over Hollywood trade unions to control the American film industry Many major films clearly toed the Soviet line, including Casablanca, Arise my Love, Paris Falling, and Mission to Moscow.